Tag: Physicians

A few years ago, I noted that the American Medical Association/Specialty Society Relative Value Scale Update Committee (RUC) has a dominant role in suggesting payment levels to CMS. It raises hard questions about price-setting in the health care sector, many of which cannot be answered because its processes are opaque. Now we know that judicial relief […]

On February 14, 2012, Marilyn Tavenner, the acting Administrator of CMS, told reporters that CMS will “re-examine the timeframe” of the planned conversion to the ICD-10 code standard. Presently, covered entities under HIPAA must fully convert from the ICD-9 coding system to ICD-10 by October 1, 2013. ICD-10, which stands for the International Classification of […]

[Ed. Note: We are pleased to welcome Andy Braver, Esq. back to Health Reform Watch. Andy is a health care attorney who recently completed an LL.M in Health Law at Seton Hall Law. Prior to entering the LL.M. program, Andy spent five years as a healthcare provider, running a state of the art medical diagnostic […]

CMS has published proposed rules for its implementation of the Physician Payment Sunshine Act (SUNSHINE ACT or Act), which was enacted by Congress as part of the 2010 Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. In short, the SUNSHINE ACT requires life science companies to report annually to CMS their conferral of anything of value, whether […]

One rare point of elite consensus is that the US needs to reduce health care costs. Frightening graphs expose America as a spendthrift outlier. Before he decamped to Citigroup, the President’s OMB director warned about how important it was to “bend the cost curve.” The President’s opponents are even more passionate about austerity. Journalists and […]